Mother's Day
by Outtie
Summary: The crew gets a visitor from their future and Colonel Young has a really bad day. COMPLETE.
1. Chapter 1

"We've just dropped out of FTL" said Mr. Brody, not that anyone didn't already know.

Colonel Everett Young leaned forward in the command chair absent-mindedly surveying the bridge crew until he located a certain cranky Scotsman. "Rush!" he growled, "Are there any gate addresses?"

"Of course there are." Dr. Nicolas Rush replied, trying his best to suppress his frustration with the lesser minds he was forced to put up with now that his secret about the Bridge was out, "Why else would the ship stop here? There are in fact _two_ gate addresses showing in range. Neither is locked out, so I assume they're safe enough."

"Yeah, safe as the last ten planets we've visited" Volker whispered to Brody as the two men sat on their hands at the navigation consoles.

"As in not very" Brody whispered back.

Ignoring the not so secret mumbling of his science team, Young unlatched his radio from his belt with the practiced ease of a veteran military man and radioed Lt. James to alert her and her team that it was time to go 'off-world', when he was rudely interrupted by Rush shouting something about in incoming wormhole.

"Wait a minute" said Col. Young, as always a little slow on the uptake where technology was concerned, "Did you say an _in_coming wormhole?"

"That's what I said Colonel, we have an _incoming_ wormhole" Rush replied tersely.

"But how can that be? We just dropped out of FTL."

"How should I know? I'm a scientist not a psychic."

Immediately on alert, Col. Young leapt from his chair and radioed for assistance as he sprinted briskly towards the gateroom.

"Lt. Scott report to the gateroom at once with an armed squad, We might be getting visitors and they have definitely _not_ been invited."

"_On my way Sir!"_ Scott replied.

In the gateroom Lieutenant Scott trailed by Sergeant Greer joined Lieutenant James and her team, pointing their weapons towards the newly forming wormhole.

_KAWOOSH! _

Just as the gate sounded the arrival of a fresh wormhole, like a doorbell chime (of sorts), Col. Young, Dr. Rush and resident 'Math Boy' Eli Wallace (whom they had found in the corridor on their way to the gateroom, sitting on the floor with his kino collection of 'accidentally' recorded shower videos), raced into the room to see what would fly out of Pandora's Box today.

Col. Young took up position in the center of his men's military formation, his arms folded calmly behind his back, his men with their weapons at the ready, while Rush and Eli choose more secure locations _behind_ the men holding the guns.

The tension in the room began to rise as the puddle rippled its magical light over the assembled crew while nothing happened. Nothing at all. Until without warning a small body hurtled through the event horizon and landed HARD, rolling just feet short of Col. Young and his men.

Expecting to see an alien monster the men are briefly stunned by the new arrival's very human features. Snapping to attention, the soldiers quickly surround the unexpected visitor and point their guns in her face.

"Who the hell are you?" demanded Col. Young, "You're certainly not one of my crew".

The apparently human and clearly very pregnant female raised her hands in the universal gesture for surrender and shook her head to the right to get her long auburn hair out of her face before coolly stating, "Are you sure about that?"

Colonel Young was sure and said so.

The stranger shrugged and said, "I understand why you doubt me Colonel, but I AM one of your crew" after a pause to let that soak in she continued, "My name is Evelyn; you may all call me Eve, if you wish. My _last_ name is none of your business for now. All you need to know is that I was born on this ship, to be more precise… I _will_ be born on this ship."


	2. Chapter 2

"Just what did you mean; you _will_ be born on this ship?" Young demanded.

"I mean, at a time I will not now specify or clarify, I will be born on this ship. On Destiny", Eve replied.

"Wait…", Eli said, "doesn't that mean…"

"Yes, Mister Wallace", she said with a smile, "that means I came '_back from the future_'".

"Why?" Young demanded.

"Let's just say I have a vested interest in history".

"Well, that is not a good enough answer", the Colonel replied, "You can't expect me to just take you at your word and turn you loose on my ship".

Eve shrugged her shoulders and sat herself down on the floor of the gateroom looking as if she was happy to wait forever if need be for the Colonel to change his mind.

"Fine. If you want to play at being the mysterious stranger, I can't stop you, but I won't have you wondering around unsupervised either" Young turned to his on again, off again love interest and only medical officer on board the ship, Lt. Tamara Johansson and asked, " Lieutenant, what can you tell us about our …cryptic visitor?"

"Well Sir" Johansson replied, "she appears to be about twenty years old, give or take a year or two and she is definitely in good health compared to the rest of us".

"Yeah, I'm wasting away over here" Eli quipped.

Johansson continued, "I'd say things are looking up for us in the future."

"Is there pizza on future Destiny?" Eli eagerly asked Eve.

Again Eve shrugged her shoulders noncommittally, "What's pizza?"

"Dang it!" said Eli looking deflated, "I can't believe that in twenty plus years nobody on this ship thought to build a pizza shop".

As usual Young ignored Eli's antics, instead choosing to study the woman more carefully. "TJ", he asked, "is there a way for us to check her DNA? You know see if she's telling the truth about who she is?"

"Well, yes, of course I can manage something, but it will take time and I don't exactly have DNA samples from everyone in the crew just lying around the medbay."

_Without warning the ship was rocked by a blast of space weaponry sending the crew reeling._

"Oh no!" Eve said with a sarcastic grin, "What could that possibly be?"

From his hip Colonel Young's radio burbled news about a drone fleet that had just appeared from behind the sun they had just recharged in. Young grabbed his radio and instructed Brody to raise the shields to maximum and then he turned to his unexpected visitor and asked, "How the Hell did you know that was going to happen?"

"Um, because she's from the _future_" Eli reminded him, adding, "Oh! _That's_ why you're sitting down! Because you knew we were about to get attacked!"

Eve clapped, "Chalk another one up for Math Boy."

Eli palled, "You're seriously not telling me that they're still calling me that in the future!" he whined, clearly getting more and more annoyed with the future crew, especially after learning about the lack of pizza in his future. How did they expect him to work like this?

Young kept his eyes trained on Eve's face through the entire exchange, trying to read her intentions when the simplest explanation possible suddenly occurred to him. "Can you do something about this?" he asked Eve, "Is that why you came back? To help us with our drone problem?"

Eve smiled, "I guess Eli isn't the only genius aboard after all" she said, "Yes Colonel. I came to help you with your drone problem."

Young battled within himself, half his instints told him the trust Eve, while the rest screamed at him that she wasn't telling him the whole truth about why she was here, but he also realized that there was no time right now for him to get to the bottom of this, so he took a deep breath and said, "Ok. What do you need from me?"

"Just take me to the chair room" Eve said.

(0)

Once in The Chair Eve leaned her head back and as the metal bolts inserted themselves into her skull Young noticed that she appeared to have ports of some kind surgically implanted on her temples which perfectly aligned with the bolts on The Chair. As soon as the bolts reached her 'ports' Eve closed her eyes, looking very much like a sleeping child, as the lights dimmed all over the ship and then shortly thereafter the shaking from the constant drone barrage stopped, this time forever.

A few moments later the lights returned to normal dim levels and the bolts retracted from Eve's skull as she opened her eyes and smiled at Colonel Young triumphantly, "You won't be having any more problems with them, Colonel" she said.

"Wait did you do?"

"Oh I just implanted a code in one of the ships, a code which included instructions to transmit it to all the other ships and when it reached the command ship it activated a second code which the command ship will now happily run about transmitting to all the other command ships it encounters until the whole lot of them end up as nothing more than big metallic radios playing Destiny's Song all over this galaxy."

Young didn't want to show it, but he was impressed, "And you did all of that in a few seconds?"

"Oh I came prepared, Colonel" she said, "The code was already programed into my nano-ports, all I had to do was sit in the chair and tell Destiny what to do with it."

"Well I don't know about the rest of these guys, but I am impressed!" Eli gushed, "That was brilliant! How long did it take you to write that code?"

"Let's see" Eve said, scrunching her nose in deep thought, "If I remember right it took YOU six days to write the code, figure out a way to make Destiny transmit it and wake up the crew before you entered intergalactic space.

"What?" Eli asked stunned.

"Your life was rather on the line at the time" Eve said, "My dad always told me you worked best under pressure."

"Well congratulations to me then" Eli said turning a mockingly smug grin on the room.

"Congratulations Eli" Young said, pulling Eli in for a man hug as a general air of joy spread throughout the ship as the knowledge that they wouldn't have the drones to worry about ever again quickly spread through Destiny's grapevine. "But now" Young said, his demeanor changing in nanosecond, "Sargent Greer if you would please escort Miss 'Eve' to the infirmary as she still has some things she needs to tell us and TJ has some tests she needs to run on our young visitor.

TJ sighed, "Colonel I told you, taking samples from everyone on the ship and running them against her DNA could take a long time."

"Oh, you won't need samples from everyone, TJ, because the young lady will now tell us who her supposed parents or grandparents or whatever are so that we can check up on her story."

"Colonel," Eve interjected, "you can't possibly expect me to reveal that."

"Oh can't I?" he said, "One order from me and you'll be having that baby in a jail cell."

"Baby?" Eve said, tilting her head in mock confusion, "What baby?"

"You're telling us you didn't know you were pregnant?" TJ asked shocked.

"Wait? I'm pregnant?" Eve said nearly shouting, turning to TJ she added, "Please Doctor… don't tell my dad!" Amused by her own antics Eve laughed so hard she nearly fell off the exam table.

"Ok SHE is _clearly_ deranged" Young stated, looking at TJ like she should come up with some Ancient device that could test for that.

"Maybe future us are just more fun to be around?" Eli offered.

"Or maybe Eve is just trying to confuse the issue" Rush said.

For once Young agreed with Rush, "Look I don't know why you're here or what you want, but if you are unwilling to trust _us_ with any kind of information that could give us cause to trust _you_… then we're through here."

"I'm sorry Colonel" Eve said, "I just can't tell you what you want to know right now."

"Why not?" Eli asked, "This is the sort of thing we need to know!"

"Need?" she said, "Not hardly, besides, if I tell you that or anything else about the future…"

"She risks changing that future" Dr. Rush finished for her, from the back near the wall, as always setting himself apart from the group and observing from the shadows (as it were).

"Exactly", Eve agreed, nodding.

"And I'm just supposed to take her word for it that she's on our side?" the Colonel asked Rush, as usual taking the contrary stance, where Rush was concerned.

"Well she did just save our lives…" Eli said.

"Noted" Young replied.

"I never said you should just take her at her word, Colonel" Rush responded, his pleasure at the news that the crew was still inhabiting Destiny and therefore continuing the mission even in the distant future, evident, "I was just letting her know, that _I_ understand her reticence. Anything she tells us could greatly affect the future; even a small act or a tiny piece of information on her part could greatly affect her own future and as judging from her well feed and …healthy appearance, things appear to be going rather well for us whenever she comes from, I see no reason to press the young woman for details."

"Oh, I get it!" Eli exclaimed, "It's like in Back to the Future when Marty starts to disappear from the photograph because he kissed his own mom in the past!"

"Yeah," said Eve, "I'm not going to be doing that."

"Well, would you care to tell us what you _will_ be doing?" asked the Colonel. "I mean, clearly, you came here for a reason and I find it hard to believe it was just to stop the drones, after all if the drones HAD managed to kill us all then you certainly wouldn't be here to stop them now, would you? And you certainly didn't look surprised to have landed yourself in the past".

Rush chuckled, it appeared Colonel Young wasn't as dumb as he sometimes seemed.

"Let's just say it's a classified mission" Eve said, "I have my orders… Sir", she smiled, clearly enjoying the moment.

"Fine, you have your orders, now I'll give mine." The Colonel said, not returning the smile at all, "Lt. Scott please escort Miss…?"

"Eve will suffice for now" she said, not falling for the ploy to learn her last name.

"Please escort _Eve_ to vacant quarters somewhere and see to it that she stays there. I want guards posted outside her door 24 hrs. a day until she decides to tell us something more concrete than '_it's_ _classified_'."

"Yes Sir", answered Scott, gesturing for Eve to lead the way towards crew quarters.

"May I make one request?" she asked.

"You can ask, I don't have to comply" Young replied.

"Understood" she said, "But if I'm going to be your prisoner here for the foreseeable future, as it appears you intend, then I'd appreciate it if you locked me up in the lesser used section of the ship. I like my prisons to be quiet and peaceful".

Great another loner on his hands Young thought, "Whatever", he said, "Just make sure she doesn't leave her 'prison' unless and until I want her to come out."

Scott nodded and escorted Eve towards the less used section of living quarters favored by the less friendly personalities among the scientists and military members of Destiny.

"Well that produced precisely nothing", said Rush once to they'd gone.

Young rolled his eyes, "You know Rush, that girl reminds me of you… she's a lot of work".

Rush shrugged, "If you have no more need of me here Colonel, I'd like to get back to my work now that I will no longer be interrupted by space battles every few days", he said, leaving the room without waiting for a reply.

"A lot a, lot a work" Colonel Young muttered at the wily scientist's retreating back.

"TJ… get started on that DNA database anyway. I'm not going to take that woman's word on anything."

TJ sighed, thinking of the sleep she would like to catch up on at some point, "Yes _Sir_".


	3. Chapter 3

_Back on the bridge…_

Colonel Young perched on the edge of his seat, leaning forward, his arms crossed over his knees, "You know, it just doesn't seem right."

"What was that, Sir?" Volker asked turning slightly away from his station to look at Young.

"Nothing Volker, I was just talking to myself, I guess."

From his console behind Young, Rush chimed in with, "They say talking to yourself is the first sign of madness."

"No," Young replied, unable to let the snide comment pass, "The first sign of madness is stepping through an upright puddle and letting a million year old artifact break you down into bits and reassemble you on the other end. We're all a little off our rockers, Rush, otherwise we wouldn't be here in the first place."

"Fair enough" Rush said, "But, I think you may be right about the young woman. She does appear to have an ulterior motive."

"Ulterior to what?" asked Young, "She hasn't given us any motive at all yet! _Ulterior_ or otherwise."

"Well she did say she was interested in history", said Rush, "Maybe she's planning on making even _more_ Kino videos for the future version of Mr. Wallace to play with. Catch the bits he missed."

"Yeah! She could be Eli junior or …junioress, however you say that," Volker interjected, "Even their names are similar, Eli… Eve, both names have three letters, both names start with an E…"

"We get the point, Mr. Volker", said Young. "At least she doesn't appear to be dangerous."

"Appearances can be deceiving" Rush added.

"I know that Rush! Why do you always have to be contrary?" Young demanded.

"Just trying to help, Colonel" Rush replied, "The one thing I think we can say for certain is that she came here for a reason. Her arrival was no accident."

"You're right," Young said, "she wasn't surprised in the slightest to find herself in the past …assuming she was telling the truth about that in the first place."

"You can never trust a woman?", Volker helpfully added.

"What would you know about it?" asked Young.

"Hey, I hear things." said Volker, "I wasn't always a space monk."

Young chuckled.

Rush looked quizzical.

Volker looked embarrassed.

Colonel Young's radio burbled.

"_Colonel Young, this is TJ_"

"_Yes, Lieutenant? I presume you have news for me."_

"_Sir, you're gonna want to come down here…"_

(0)

Clearly news of the DNA match had filtered through the ship's grapevine somehow as Young with Rush and Volker in tow, found Camille Wray, Eli and Chloe Armstrong already scattered around the medbay waiting to hear the results of TJ's DNA search and since they'd all contributed DNA samples of their own to the cause, Young didn't see any reason to shoo them out.

As soon as The Colonel arrived the group pressed in a little closer waiting to hear what TJ had to report…

"She's mine? " Young asked for the third time, "I'm her … father? "Are you sure?"

"As sure as I can be using Ancient equipment I'm not entirely familiar with, Sir" TJ replied, "I called you as soon as I was sure about all this."

"TJ, does this mean you, I mean, is she…" Young looked around the room noting the presence of Rush, Wray, Volker, Chloe and Eli drinking every word with varying degrees of feigned disinterest, "… ours?"

TJ looked at her feet to avoid Young's searching eyes, "No" she said, "Her DNA doesn't match mine. I checked that right away."

Young looked at his own shoes as he was momentarily too stunned to speak.

"So if TJ isn't the Eve's mother, than who is?" Eli asked.

"That's the problem" said TJ, "Once Colonel Young's sample matched, I ran Eve's DNA against every single woman on board this ship."

"And?" said Wray.

"And I found nothing" said TJ, "Whoever this child's mother is, she's isn't on board Destiny. "

"Not yet anyway" said Eli.

"Well we must get a female passenger of some kind in the future" said Rush, the young woman clearly stated that she would be born on this ship at an unspecified time in the future, and if TJ is correct that the DNA gave parental match to Colonel Young… "

"Yes, that much I can tell from the DNA match data, she has to be either The Colonel daughter of his mother, and I have to assume…"

"I assure you TJ" said Young with a low chuckle, "Eve is definitely not my mother"

"Splendid" said Rush, "so that gives us a window of say forty years for us to pick up a female astronaut…"

"How exactly did you come up with that number" Young asked.

"Well, the human male is perfectly capable of reproduction even into his 'golden years', Colonel, and of man of your age can reasonably expect to live…"

"I get your point Rush" said Young.

"As I was saying" Rush continued, "if Lt. Johansson is correct, and we have to assume she is, then we should, at some point, probably in the near future, find or be found by another group of humans, perhaps scientists and other support personnel from Earth, which will include at least one fertile female who will in time become our young visitor's mother."

"With The Colonel's help of course" said TJ her voice betraying the hurt she felt at the idea that the father of _her_ child would shortly have another child with a different woman.

"You're not seriously going to being angry with me over having a baby with a woman I haven't even met, in a future that as far as we know may not even happen?" Young said defensively.

TJ looked at the Colonel like she just _might_ be angry with him over his having a baby in the future with a woman he hasn't even met yet.

Eli took the news slightly better, "New people at last! Or you know at least one new person. That sounds great to me! Can't wait to meet the new people! Right Volker?"

"Yeah" Volker replied, "That should be great. Maybe they'll bring pie."

"That's probably what the natives said when the Mayflower landed in America" said Rush.

Colonel Young's radio burbled.

"_Colonel Young, this is Lieutenant Scott" _

"Go ahead Scott_"_

"_Uh, Sir, it appears our visitor has escaped."_

"What_?"_


	4. Chapter 4

_Outside Eve's 'prison cell'…_

"How did this happen?" Young barked at Scott and Greer and they stood at attention outside Eve's room.

"I don't know, Sir" said Scott, "She didn't respond to our knock, so we opened the door and she simply wasn't there anymore. We searched the room to see if she was hiding until Sargent Greer noticed that the vent grating was loose."

"So you're telling me I've got a pregnant stranger with unknown intentions lose on my ship, crawling through the vents?"

"Yes, we… yes Sir."

"Alright…" Young paused to think, "Scott, I want you and Greer to enter the vents and see if you can follow her trail, I'm hoping she won't be able to move very quickly in her condition, but let's not be surprised again by not taking her seriously as a threat. Ok? …Rush! I want you and Eli to find a way to track her. Find out where she is, where she's heading and if possible, what the Hell she's up too".

Without waiting to see his orders carried out, Colonel Young walked off to catch a few moments to himself to try and process what was happening. "_How can she be my daughter? Could the DNA test have been faked somehow? Can I trust her? I would never name my kid Eve! Scott might, but not me. Does something happen to JT? Why else would I be having babies with someone else on this ship?"_

Young exhaled slowly, closing his eyes as if he could find the answers on the inside of his eyelids, "Damn," he said aloud, "TJ isn't going to let this one go".

"No she probably won't at that."

Young opened his eyes and spun around to glare at Rush, who seemed to have a talent to be where he wasn't supposed to be.

"It's really none of your business Rush, you just worry about following my orders and finding my… finding our missing guest."

"Well that's what I came to tell you, Colonel, you see for the last three weeks Mr. Brody has been scanning the ship looking for damage and especially for air leaks."

"And you believe this scan will help us find Eve?"

"Yes, you see one of the best indicators of a leak is temperature change, so it should be easy enough for us to alter the program to search for human levels of body heat."

"So we should be able to track her."

"Yes, Eli should have made the necessary adjustments already. He can do these things very quickly when he wants to."

"Glad to hear he's motivated. So am I if I'm honest."

"Yes, but probably for different reasons. She's a fairly attractive young lady, your daughter."

"Well if you think I'd let her date you, you have another thing coming!"

"I think you'd have very little say in what that lady does or doesn't do, Colonel. Congratulations. You appear to have raised an intelligent and independent young woman. In any case, I wasn't declaring any intentions of my own towards your daughter, merely letting you know that Eli might have some."

"In that case… thank you for your concern, Dr. Rush. Was there anything else?"

"Not really, no. But I have observed that you seem more than a little bit disturbed by this turn of events."

"Of course I'm disturbed, Rush! Wouldn't you be disturbed if a woman came out of nowhere and turned out be your daughter?"

"Astonished more like."

"What, you never plan on having children, Rush?"

"It's starting to seem just a tad unlikely, Colonel."

"Too much of a distraction from your work, I suppose."

"No. I just… my late wife, Gloria and I never had children. We'd always thought there would be time for that later on, but then, by the time we were ready… other things got in the way."

"So, you're just going to be alone forever?" Young asked, "One man against the universe?"

"There are worse ways to spend a life Colonel" Rush answered, "my work, this ship will be my legacy, whether any of our kind are around in a thousand years to see it or not."

"Hey, Rush… If you ever get tired of tilting at windmills, I'm always available for that game of chess."

Rush smiled, "We might just have to do that Colonel, once this situation is cleared up, of course."

"Of course."

"_Eli Wallace to Colonel Young"_

Colonel Young retrieved his radio and answered, "Yes, Eli. What is it?"

"_We've found a way to track Eve! She's moving towards the rear of the ship, towards one of the unexplored regions!"_

"Ok, thank you Eli, if you'd be so kind as to give us directions, Dr. Rush and I will try to locate Eve and …persuade her to return to her room."

"_No problem Colonel. I'll have Volker do the same for Scott and Greer."_

"Very good Eli, you'll make Captain in no time."

"_Really?"_

"One step at a time Mr. Wallace. Now about those directions…"


	5. Chapter 5

_In the vents…_

Sargent Greer was having a bad day. First Lisa called off their date to mess around with those plants of hers, then he disappointed his commanding officer by letting the prisoner escape and now here he was, jammed into a vent shaft that was clearly not intended for someone his size to go crawling around in for extended periods.

"We've been crawling through these vents for hours!" he complained to Scott's backside and he crawled through the vent in front of Greer, "We should get out of here and join the Colonel."

"You know as well as I do that we're going this way in case she doubles back through the vents. The Colonel can handle her out there; he needs us to be able to handle her in here."

"All the same, I just don't like this. She must be smart right? Smart enough to get the Colonel to have her locked up in a room that had exactly the kind of escape route she needed _and yet_ we keep finding signs wherever we go that point us in the direction she went."

"She's just in a hurry Greer; she didn't have time to cover her trail better."

"I don't know about that, to me it almost feels like she wants us to follow her, Sir" said Greer.

"Well, hopefully wherever she's leading us is close" said Scott, "My knees are killing me"

(0)

Young and Rush head down a corridor following Eli's directions from the control room.

"You're sure about this Eli?"

"_Yeah, perfectly sure, she has to be headed for that room. It's the only place that vent she's in let's out now that she's past everything else."_

"Eli, this is Dr. Rush, do we have any information on this room?"

"_Nope. It's just a room. It does have life support on, which is weird, since we've been pretty choosy about keeping the lights on only in the sections we're currently using, but all the computer seems to say is that it's a 'storage' area of some kind."_

"Begs the question", said Rush, "what did the Ancients store there that a woman from the future might want to get to in a great hurry?"

"Only one way to find out. Let's go…"

(0)

While Rush and Young headed for the Ancient storage room on foot, Scott & Greer make their way there via the ships vents at Mr. Volker's direction, but neither team sees any further sign of Eve.

(0)

"You're sure this is where she was heading, Rush?"

"Yes, Colonel, this room is the room Eli found. It's where she was heading."

"Well then, where is she? I don't see her."

"I don't know! Perhaps she's hiding in one of those crates. They're piled nearly o the ceiling in some places and I'm sure it would be all too easy for a person to hide in here. The heat signal was moving this way and there is no way it made it out of the room without passing us or running into Scott and Greer in the vents."

"So where is she, Rush?"

"I don't know! Perhaps she went out the airlock!"

"Why would she do that?"

"I don't know, Colonel, why would she be in such a hurry to get to an old storage closet? ...unless."

"Unless what, Rush?"

"Unless there was something stored in here that she needed. Needed desperately enough to escape from _her own father_ and make us a merry chase through the ship."

"Look, Rush, that girl may share my DNA, allegedly, but right now she is about as much my daughter as she is yours …I don't know her and if she knows me, than she should know better than to run away!"

"Such anger, are you planning to drop her off on the nearest planet and leave her for dead then?"

"Not funny Rush. You have no idea what it's like to be a parent!"

"Neither do you."

"Fine! So what do _you_ propose we do, Rush?"

"Well since she clearly wanted something in this room and she herself is either hiding somewhere in this room _or_ she stepped out the airlock, which seems unlikely… I suggest we search this room from top to bottom and try to find your daughter or at least get an idea of what she was here for."

"Just call her Eve for now. We'll cross the daughter bridge when we come to it."

"Whatever you say Colonel."

_Young and Rush begin searching the room, starting in the front; they begin examining every box and shining a light in every crevice. When Scott and Greer finally squeeze their way out of the vents, having also found nothing, Young tasks them to stand guard at the door and at the vent shaft respectively to make sure Eve won't manage to escape if and when they find her. Once everybody understood the plan, Young and Rush returned to their slow and methodical search._

(0)

_Sometime later…_

Colonel Young looked around and realized that Rush was no longer beside him opening boxes, he backtracked down the corridor they'd made by moving boxes until he located his wayward scientist.

"Rush? Where did you disappear too?" Young asked, his frustration at the slow pace of the search starting to show.

"I didn't disappear anywhere Colonel" Rush replied, "I simply stopped searching because I think I've found the something very interesting."

Young looked at the machine Rush was studying, it was a sort of console with more buttons than Young cared to count and handles on pointing out from both sides.

"It looks portable." Young said.

"It is I think" said Rush, "But I'm not quite sure what it is yet, at first glance it appears to be a medical device of some kind. When I take hold of the handles on this side, readings come up on the panels which seem to indicate my vital signs, heart rate, blood pressure and the like."

"So what? TJ can tell you that without a fancy alien medical device."

"It must be more than that Colonel! If you would just help me turn it around so that I can see the panels on the other side of the console, perhaps we could get a better idea of what this device is really for."

"Oh no you don't, Rush! We are not going down this road again. Remember what happened the last time."

"In case you hadn't noticed Colonel, this is not a chair like the one to which you are referring, it's just a console and if you notice it doesn't even appear to be connected to the ship, and all I want is for you to grab the other set of handles and help me pull this out so that I can have a wee look at the other side. Can you just do that for me?"

"Ok fine, Rush, but you have 10 minutes! No more. In case you've forgotten we have a search to finish."

"Fine, just take that end and help me move it over a few feet."

Rush took hold of the two handles on right side and indicated for Young to take the two on the left. Rush said they should lift together and carry the machine out into the main corridor of the room so that he would be able to read the back panels. As soon as Colonel Young's hands close on the handles, something deep within the machine begins to whir and lights begin to flash all over the device as streams of data flow across the panels in Ancient.

"Rush, what is it doing?" Young asked, already sorry he'd agreed to this.

"I can't tell Colonel, just help me move it over far enough so that I can get behind it and read the data on the other side."

Suddenly the machines handles started to get hot, Rush and Young both tried to let go of the handles only to discover that their hands were stuck onto the handles almost as if their hands had become magnetized.

"RUSH!" Young barked, "What's happening?"

"How should I know Colonel! I'm in the same situation you are!"

As the two men struggled to pull their hands away they felt some kind of mechanical arm come out of the console and clamp onto their bodies, holding them in place as surely as it kept their hands gripping the machines handles against their wills.

Panicked, Rush looked down at the data streaming across the panels, both side now visible, trying to see an indication of how much trouble they were really in, when he saw something that instantly filled him with dread.

"What is it Rush? What are you seeing?" Young asked, panic starting to creep into his voice.

"A countdown" said Rush quietly, "I see a countdown."

"A countdown to what Rush? What the Hell did you do?"

As the countdown quickly neared its end Rush screwed his eyes tight and hoped whatever was about to happen wouldn't hurt too much. From his last look at Young's face he was pretty sure something of his would hurt by the end of the day no matter what the machine did to them.


	6. Chapter 6

Young and Rush's screams brought Sargent Greer and Lieutenant Scott running, weapons drawn. What they found when they arrived wasn't exactly what they were expecting. Doctor Rush was kneeling over Colonel Young shaking him hard.

"Get away from him Rush!" Greer growled, shoving his weapon into the scientist's face for emphasis.

"I didn't do anything!" Rush said, raising his arms defensively. "When the machine finally let us go he collapsed, I was just trying to wake him up!"

"Wait" said Scott, "Did you say 'when the machine let you go?"

"Yes! This machine attacked us or something" Rush said, "Whatever it did hurt like Hell for a second or two and then I felt, just warm all over and then it just let go."

"So why are you fine while the Colonel is on the floor?" Greer asked.

"I don't know! The machine held him a few seconds longer than it did me. I don't know why. What ever happened maybe he got a double dose of it."

"You'd better hope whatever it did to him isn't permanent, Rush," said Greer, "Because I promise you if he doesn't get better fast, you're going to get a lot worse even faster."

"Not now Ron" said Scott as he knelt behind his Colonel and felt for a pulse, not liking the way this situation looked at all. "I think we'd better call TJ…"

_(0)_

"He's going to be fine" said TJ, putting a comforting hand on Scott's shoulder, "It appears he was… injected with something. I'll know more in a few hours."

"What about Rush?" Scott asked.

"He also has an injection mark on his abdomen. It's similar to the Colonel's, but he doesn't appear to be as affected by whatever that machine did as the Colonel is. I'd still like to keep him here for observation until we find out what actually happened."

"Would it help if we brought you the machine?" Scott asked.

"It might, but I don't want anyone touching that machine until we figure out what it did. I don't need another set of patients in here."

"Ok, I'll get Brody, Park and Eli to go down there and take some readings, but I'll make sure they know not to touch the handles."

_(0)_

Adam Brody was already having a bad day without adding on a field trip to collect an Ancient death machine from a big dark room full of dust covered mystery boxes that reminded him of his not nearly brief enough stint at Area 51.

"So, I guess this is it" he said to his fellow sufferers Eli and Dr. Lisa Park, not bothering to try and cover up his apprehension about messing with something that had already KO'd the Colonel and gotten Rush confined to the medbay.

Brody, Eli and Dr. Park looked at each other, each silently declaring they did not want to be the first the touch the thing.

"Uh, ok, I guess I'll see if I can turn it on" said Brody, "and then, you know step back and see what it does."

"Just don't stand too close ok" Eli said.

"Well Rush said it didn't actually do anything when he was messing around with it by himself. The pain and death didn't start until Young grabbed the other set of handles and they started trying to move the machine" said Park, "So just make sure you don't try and pick it up by the handles."

"How else are we going to move it?" Eli asked, "I didn't think to bring the Kino sled."

"I don't think we were supposed to move it, Eli, just you know, take readings and report back, but the Kino sled is a great idea!" said Park, "Why don't you go get that and we'll wait here not touching anything."

"But it's all the way back in the gateroom!" Eli wailed.

"We don't need to move it" said Brody, "At least not yet. All we need to do is to find TJ that hypodermic or whatever skewered Rush and Young and get a sample of whatever it injected into them. "

"Or took out" said Eli, as always a ray of sunshine.

Mr. Brody sat down on his heels by the machine and timidly felt the side panels looking for a way to open the machine to find what they needed.

"If there is an access panel on this thing, I sure can't find it" he said.

"Maybe we can shoot it open" said Eli, "I don't suppose anybody thought to bring a gun?"

"They're probably all back in the gateroom with the Kino sled" said Brody.

Park edged somewhat closer to the machine, straining her neck to see the readout on the control panels, which it appeared had never been deactivated, without actually touching the device "Maybe we should just try and do what they did to activate the whatever it was and try to get it to open whatever panel the big needle comes out of" she said.

"Nah, I like Eli's plan better" said Brody, "It seems slightly less dangerous to let Eli shoot it, than to let it try and do to two of us whatever it did to Young and Rush."

"No, what I mean", said Park, "Is Rush said the machine grabbed them and held them in place. What we if like, found a way to dangle above the machine somehow and then we grab onto the handles from above, so that when it tries to grab us and stab us we'll be out of reach and then Eli could put, you know, a wrench in the works somehow and keep the machine's panel wedged open somehow so we can get at the mechanism inside."

"Yeah, I guess that could work, if you know we had some kind of rappelling gear and a way to fasten it to the ceiling" said Eli.

"Gateroom" said Brody.

"Some actual training in rappelling from a ceiling would be nice too" Park added.

Eli looked up and tried to estimate the high of the ceiling. He couldn't even make a guess in the dim light. Then he looked around the room itself, vaguely trying to come up with a plan that _didn't_ involve walking all the way back to the Gateroom.

"You know," he said, "Maybe we don't need military gear to try Park's plan. Maybe we could move a couple of these bigger boxes around the machine and then Park and I can grab the handles from up on top of the boxes where we should be safe and then Brody can lay down in front of the machine and wait for the machine to open so that he can get inside to get that sample."

"Why do I have to do the dangerous part?" asked Brody, "It's Park's plan, maybe she should lie down next to the machine and try to grab the hypodermic."

"I'd say it'd more Eli plan now with the boxes and everything" put in Park.

The two scientists looked at Eli.

Eli looked at the two scientists.

"How does rock, paper, scissors sound?" Eli asked.


	7. Chapter 7

"So, Doc… how's he doing?"

TJ turned around to find Eve back in the medbay sitting beside Colonel Young, holding his hand as if she had every right to be there. Which TJ, supposed, she did at that.

"He's doing better" TJ said carefully, "I think he'll be awake soon. I just wish I knew what happened to him" To them she corrected herself. She'd already half-forgotten Rush in her concern over Everett, which disturbed her. "How did you get in here by the way?" she asked, "There are guards posted, at least there were supposed to be."

"I'm sure they're still out there" said Eve smiling, "Let's just say I know a shortcut and leave it at that for now."

"That kind of evasive answer won't go over well with the Colonel when he wakes up, you know."

"Oh I know. Believe me I know" Eve replied.

"You do know this situation is largely your fault. Don't you?"

"He never could manage to stay out of trouble" said Eve, smiling.

"I usually think of the Colonel as the man who gets us out of trouble" said TJ, "Not in it."

"I wasn't talking about him" said Eve with a surprisingly deep chuckle and a gesture at the still sleeping Young, "I meant Rush."

TJ looked towards the bed where Rush was apparently sleeping and took this as an opportunity to get some information out of their visitor, "So where you come from… Rush is still causing trouble there?"

"Oh he's slowed down a bit of late" said Eve, her eyes taking on a distant unfocused look, before she turned to TJ with decision and said, "In fact that's kind of why I came here."

"I don't quite understand."

"What I mean," said Eve "is that my father is dying and I came here to try and save him."

"Dying?"

"Yes, I'm afraid so. We've tried everything, literally everything else before we even considered this crazy ass plan, but nothing worked", she said, "you see, at some point in your future, my father will be infected by a pathogen on a resupply mission, we never knew exactly which planet. He was the only person affected on the away team and …and _you_ said it could have happened years before the symptoms started to appear. It was a very slow pathogen, but none the less deadly for it."

"And you have a plan to prevent this infection?" Dr. Rush interjected.

TJ turned to see that Dr. Rush was now sitting up in his bed and taking great interest in their conversation. He'd probably just been pretending to sleep, that sounded like something he would do.

"We've had a lot of plans" said Eve, "This one is actually plan C, I believe."

"Can't wait to hear what plans A and B were" said Rush, "I trust directed time travel was a distant third."

"Actually" Eve said pointing at her swollen belly, "This was plan B" she said laughing softly at a joke only she understood, "Plan A was a total blood transfusion, which was both messy and ineffective. As for plan B…" she looked down at her belly again, "it proved to be too time consuming. Trust me; I didn't think this plan would work either" Eve told him, "But my… mother never gave up and neither of them would let me give up either."

"I don't suppose you'd care to tell us a little more about your mother" said TJ, "We compared your DNA to every woman on this ship and came up empty."

"Did you indeed" said Eve again with the surprising chuckle, "I can see why you might be confused, but I assure you, my mother is already aboard the Destiny, you just weren't looking in the right place."

"I don't suppose you'd care to elaborate further?" said Rush.

"Not at this time" Eve replied, "I think in this case, it would be better if you solved that little mystery on your own."

Rush shrugged, trying his best to appear disinterested in the hope she would tell them after all.

"So what is it that you need from me?" TJ asked, "I presume you decided to confide in me because you need my help."

"True enough" said Eve, "I need a tissue sample or some active hair follicles, anything from my father _before_ the infection takes hold. Any sample of his living DNA should do."

"How do you know the infection hasn't already happened?" Rush asked.

"As best as we could determine, the infection happened somewhere between 2 and 5 years before we found it, we timed this visit to occur before that period."

"How exactly do you plan on getting this DNA sample back to your own time?" asked Rush.

"I don't" Eve replied quietly, "I knew when I stepped through that gate that it was unlikely I'd ever be able to return."

"That must have been a hard choice for you" said TJ, placing her hand on Eve's shoulder.

"I'd do anything for my father" Eve stated, her voice strong, "Anything."

TJ felt very moved by this simple statement, it reminded her of how much her own father had meant to her and how she would do anything to bring _him_ back if she could.

Even Rush didn't seem to have anything to say, but he_ had_ recently been injected by something, maybe it was an empathy machine.

"Ok" said TJ finally, "I'll get you your sample and I'll make sure it's kept safe until he needs it."

"Thank you… Tamara."

"You're welcome, Eve."

TJ turned to her medical supplies and collected what she needed. As she was about to swab the inside of the Colonel's cheek, Eve stopped her.

"No, not him" she said.

"But, you said you needed his DNA" said TJ, confused.

"No I said I needed, my _father's_ DNA" said Eve, "Colonel Young is not my father, not exactly."

"What's this about fathers and DNA anyway?" Young muttered.

"Colonel!" exclaimed TJ, "You're awake."

"Obviously" he said, trying to ease himself up into a sitting position and only making it about halfway before a wave of dizziness made him think better of it. "Now would someone like to catch me up here? I seemed to have missed most of best parts of this story."

TJ brought Colonel Young up to speed on Eve's story with a few piquant comments from Rush.

"Wait a minute" Young said to Eve as TJ ended her report, "What do you mean I'm not your father? TJ told me she ran my DNA against yours and it was a match!"

"Yes, I'm sure it was" she said, "but you're still not my father."

"TJ, I don't suppose you understand what this girl is saying, do you?"

"No, Sir" she replied, "DNA doesn't lie".

"Perhaps" said Eve, "But in this case it was _has_ rather led you astray."

"Well if Colonel Young isn't your father" said Rush, "Who is?"

Eve smiled and said, "Funny _you_ should ask, Dr. Rush"

Eve looked at Dr. Rush and smiled again.

For once Rush was speechless.

Young looked at Rush.

Rush looked at Young.

Both turned simultaneously to look at Eve.

Eve looked at her unconventional parents and smiled.

Rush put his hands over his puncture wound, his face full of disbelief.

Young wasn't sure exactly what had just happened, but he looked like he didn't like.

TJ looked amused and then relieved.

"So," said TJ, "you're saying is Colonel Young isn't your father after all?"

"That is correct."

"And Rush is your father?" said Young.

"That is correct" said Eve, "But as you may have already surmised, there is a reason that my DNA so closely matches Colonel Young's DNA, but I assure you he isn't my father."

"Miss… uh" started Rush.

"You can just call me Eve" she said, "I'm sure that would be easier for you right now".

"Very well, _Eve_… would you care to explain this claim of yours that I am somehow against all logic, your father?"

"Oh, it's not so complicated really" she said, "In fact I'm pretty sure you already know and are just trying to find another possible solution. If you doubt your own intelligence, just ask yourself one question… why now?"

"Why now?"

"Yes, why am I willing to tell you about this now, when I wouldn't just a few hours ago?"

"You said you didn't wish to affect the future."

"Yes, but more specifically I didn't wish to affect my own future …existence."

"So," said Rush starting to recover his senses, "What you mean is that you did not wish to in any way prevent your own conception and the reason you are now willing to speak about this is because your conception has now occurred?"

"Very astutely reasoned, Doctor Da" she said.

"Please… don't say that" said Rush as pinched the bridge of his nose, as he was fast developing a headache, "Wait… then what that means is…" Rush from Eve to Young and back again, "That the machine we recently, uh, encountered, is actually a kind of Ancient medical device used for… fertility?"

Eve nodded.

"So when it injected us a few hours ago, it was collected genetic material to create a… a baby?"

"Yes, I'm afraid so" said Eve, "Collecting genetic material _and_ depositing genetic material" she said, giving Colonel Young an apologetic smile, "That last part is the most important."

"Wait a minute!" Young yelled, "Are you telling me that machine impregnated me with Rush's baby?"

"Surprise!" she replied, grabbing Young's head and planting a kiss on his forehead,"…Mum."

TJ turned her back on the group as her shoulders started to shake with un-repressible laughter. It appeared Colonel Young wouldn't be cheating on her after all. At least not the way she'd been thinking he would.

"_TJ!_" a panicked Park squawked from the radio at the Lieutenant's hip.

"What is it Lisa?" she asked, her military training helping her to regain her calm efficiency quickly.

"We have a medical emergency in the storage room!"

Even Eve looked surprised at this turn of events.

"Oh no" said Young. "Not another one…"

_(0)_

Scott, James, Greer and Dr. Volker carried Eli Wallace and Mr. Brody into the medbay and laid the unconscious men on two of the free beds as Lieutenant Johansson followed closely to check their vitals were stable.

Once she was sure they were both all right, she lifted Mr. Brody's shirt, "Yup. We've got another one", she then lifted Eli's shirt, "Same here", she turned to Park, "I thought I told you three to be careful!"

"It seemed like a good plan at the time" Park replied, "We were only trying to help!"

Eli groaned and tried to sit up, "What happened?"

"Well," said TJ, "It appears that machine you were fiddling with has impregnated Colonel Young with Dr. Rush's baby."

"Seriously?"

"I'm afraid it looks that way" said Rush, still slightly stunned.

"You're afraid? You?" screamed Young, "Because I'm pretty damn near panicking right about now!"

"Wait" said Eli, "I'm not going to have Brody's baby or anything am I?"

"I'm not actually sure" said TJ, "I guess I'll need to set up some scans for the four of you to try and confirm what's happening. In the meantime I guess congratulations may be in order."

"Yeah" said Volker, "Congratulations on your, um, expectations, Colonel."

"One more word from anyone and I'll have you scrubbing the hull in the damaged space suit!" Young yelled.

"Oh, this is positively the best 'Yo momma' joke I've ever heard!" said Eli, unable to stop himself, "Or the worst one, you know depending on how those scans turn out for me.

Eve leaned over kissed Colonel Young on the forehead again, "Thank you, Colonel. I know you're not happy right now, but you always said it was worth it in the end, after all I turned out ok, didn't I?"

"I'd say the jury is still out on that one, young lady" Young replied, less angry now.

"Yes, well," said Rush rubbing his hands together in amusement, "I rather suppose I should be the first to wish you a happy day, Colonel…Happy _Mother's Day_ Colonel Young."

"Yeah, happy frickin' Mother's Day" Young muttered.


End file.
